


more naked than flesh

by Notfye



Category: Greek and Roman Mythology, The Iliad - Homer, The Song of Achilles - Madeline Miller
Genre: Alternate Universe - Academia, Alternate Universe - Boarding School, Alternate Universe - Dark Academia, Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Alternate Universe - Girls School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/F, Genderswap, Modern Era, POV First Person
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-20
Updated: 2018-11-24
Packaged: 2019-05-09 04:27:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14709089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Notfye/pseuds/Notfye
Summary: “You’ll go somewhere else in September,” she said. This meant, You will not finish your freshman year. It was April.I nodded, mutely, and that was the end of it.(In which there are girls’ boarding schools, Achilles’ truest flaw is wrath, and Greek tragedies are not allowed to be anything but.)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Can you BELIEVE it took me this long to (a) notice that I could only relate to male characters, (b) decide that needed to be rectified, and (c) actually write this damn fic that I've been meaning to write for probably about a year and a half?
> 
> Thank you, of course, to Fen, who is less of a beta and more of a person who listens to me talk about Greeks a great deal and has also helped me in figuring out how this story will go.
> 
> Title is from a bit of Sappho because, honestly, what else would I have named it?

I was fourteen when they threw me out of school. 

It was not the first time that it had happened, but it was the most severe; Usually, it was not explicit expulsion, but a suggestion of leaving, gentle words that noted my failings in school, with stern meaning underneath them. I would not come back the next year, my mother’s money would send me somewhere else. I could pretend all was well. 

This time, I punched a girl.

Or, I was accused of it, and that was enough to send me packing. 

(Here is the truth: I threw no punch, just shoved the girl, and she, turning her head, smashed her nose against a locker. It is a strong memory, the dark blood dripping down the girl’s face, down the hand she lifted to assess the damage, down onto the marble floor. I didn’t say that it was self-defense. They wouldn’t have listened if I had.)

My mother was called to the school, and even now I can see her, standing in the doorway to the headmistress’ office, haloed by the light from the hallway windows. I had sat, quaking beneath my skin, fearing her reaction. The headmistress herself was stiff and spoke in a low melody, as though she was truly pained by having to send me away. No questions were asked about the bruises on my arms and face; There was nothing to be done about them now that I was leaving.  

Vividly, I can see the ride back to our home. My mother driving, her hands clenched tight around the steering wheel, angry at me, the daughter who could not even properly stay out of fights. 

“You’ll go somewhere else in September,” she said, her voice frustrated but cold. This meant,  _ You will not finish your freshman year. _ It was April. 

I nodded, mutely, and that was the end of it. 

 

For the two months that I should have been in school, I floated through life. There was nothing to keep me bound to the present, so I had no reason to work against my tendency to daydream. In the mornings I would walk to the willow grove at the back of our house and sit behind the curtains of leaves, dream myself somewhere else. By the time I would go back to the house for dinner, I felt disoriented and strange, unused to the world I now found myself in. 

Summer came, and with it, temperatures too hot to bear. I returned to my room, not the same as the willows, too impersonal and foreign and clean. There, the hot days turned in a sort of delirium, a fever of rolling days and books that I did not understand.

That was the other thing. I would try to teach myself what I had missed at the end of the year. I was never a good student, though I could do well if I made an effort and when teachers worked to help me understand. But a student with a bad reputation, for violence and bad grades, is rarely given a hand as they fall. 

My self-given lessons did little for me. The books didn’t make sense, and the words swam before me, unable to be caught. By the time school was starting, I was shaky and felt stupid; My stomach would cramp for days with anxiety over what I did or did not know. But the summer was over, and any attempts I made were fruitless. It was best to cut the agony short. 

 

When I arrived, it was to a tour they gave to the new families. My mother stood behind me, not entirely angry but not at all happy, either. She had wanted the affair over with, had imagined it would only take, at most, fifteen minutes to leave me, and then she would be off again. 

They showed us the important things, like the brick dorms and the building accented in marble that had the classrooms in it. They showed us tennis courts that burned beneath the sun and a blue-green river where watersports were practiced. They showed us a forest that hid one of the borders of the campus. Beneath the overgrown brambles, there was a footpath, hardly noticeable in the best light, and in the darkness of all the trees I had to strain my eyes to see it. Green, dark, and cool.

When we returned to the front of the school’s complex, my mother looked at me coldly and wished me farewell.  Then, she turned back to the parking lot, leaving me to the mercy of the marble and iron walls of building before me. 

The wind blew. A few early leaves fell.

 

There was no one else in my dorm room when I arrived. It felt dusty, memories of past students pressed into the air, into me. Cold, and grey. I put my bag on my bed.

The sheets were red and the blankets white. Oakwood windowsills and desks, two of them, one for each of us. Two small closets, too, with a tiny mirror in each. It was all very plain. And, finding nothing of interest in the room, nor having a particular interest in meeting my roommate, I left it.

Instead, I walked around the rest of the buildings. I wanted to find a place away from people, someplace deserted that I might hide in. What I found were the practice rooms. They were blissfully silent, soundproofed. Wood paneling and dirty carpet, with rounded lights above. There were four of these rooms, though only one was completely devoid of instruments. 

This one, I tentatively took as my own. 

It was quiet there, and, despite the day and the chaos outside, of new students or things that needed to be moved into dorm rooms, I could pretend that I did not exist.

It was not so very different from home, really. 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The classes did not feel different from anywhere else. I didn’t understand geometry more than before; I still had trouble conjugating French verbs. The days were the same as any other, just a different building, a different cast of classmates.

When I went back to my room, once the sun had begun to set, my roommate was there. She turned when she heard my footsteps. 

She looked at me plainly, did not smile. Still, she was beautiful, there was no doubt. It spurned jealousy so quickly I did not even have a moment to question it. 

“Are you Patroclus?” She asked. She pronounced my name strangely. 

“Yes,” I said. 

“I’m Achilles.” She turned away from me and continued with whatever she had been doing before I arrived. I began to unpack in the silence. The room was taut and still between us; I felt as if she might be staring at my back, even though I could still hear her hands moving. 

I didn’t turn. 

 

Eventually we went to dinner. Not together, even though we walked side by side. But at the doors to the hall, she went to one table, and I went to another. 

I sat at a table in a corner. I didn’t want to meet my peers or talk to anyone - what would be the point? I’d be here, at most, month - and sulking was what I thought to be the best option. 

My eyes slipped to Achilles. She sat amongst friends, all appearing to be athletes. Suddenly, the quick jealousy and stillness in the room made sense. I could see the turn of my mother’s lips, twisted, her seeing what could have been for her own daughter, and what she got instead. If this revelation had come a month later, it would have pushed me from my mother. But it came at a time when it pushed me to her instead, as if my hatred of this girl might please her. Achilles was everything that had been hoped of me, but I was average in anything I touched, and already I knew it would be hard to be around such glory so often and know that I could not possibly oppose it. 

In the days that followed, I learned about her. She was a talented singer and musician; the harp in the practice room next to mine was hers. In those first evenings, when I saw the light in the third room was on, I would turn and return to our dorm, angry for her very existence.

She was also the pride and joy of the track team, could leave anyone in the dust with hardly a sweat. I had not seen her run yet, but already heard the gossip and scorn of her grace and beauty. ( _ At least I am not alone,  _ I thought then,  _ Other people hate her for it, too.)  _

I ran in the mornings, sometimes, the darkness of the predawn sky let me pretend that I was blissfully alone on earth. I remember that in the early days, I would do it stubbornly, ragefully.  _ This is mine, too.  _

It took me a few days more to realize this, but she was popular. It was not surprising, how could she not be? Powerful and pretty, there was little to hold her back. It sat well on her, the crown of a natural born leader. And, of course, this too reminded me of what I hated about myself. 

***

The classes did not feel different from anywhere else. I didn’t understand geometry more than before; I still had trouble conjugating French verbs. The days were the same as any other, just a different building, a different cast of classmates. 

Routines are funny things. Look away and they will grow, in any circumstance. This is how it was, here, with me: I would wake, run around the border of campus, avoiding the forest. Take a shower and dress, then go to breakfast. The classes would pass in a blur, for I didn’t understand them enough to be engaged, and I was still shamed and burning from my inability to teach myself. After, I’d go to the practice room or my dorm, wherever Achilles was not. Eventually I found that she was on a practice schedule, and I conformed to that as well, avoiding her whenever I could. 

Homework was a doozy. Occasionally, as I did it, I would laugh in the terror of having no idea what the words or numbers on the page in front of me meant. Only by sheer luck did most classes not require me to go up and write on the board often, but French started with work from the night before going onto the board, while in Latin, girls were called at random to suffer through noun declensions in front of the class. At least in Latin, we were all relatively terrible, and I could blend with my classmates in that. But in French, where most girls were at least passable, my inability was stark and drew more attention than I wanted. 

The girl who sat next to me would eye me when I came back from the board every day. I could tell that she wanted to correct whatever I had written, but she always bit her lip and didn’t say a word. Until, apparently, what I had done was too terrible to bear. 

“Do you want some help?” she asked.

After a beat, I nodded and she jumped into how I had mixed up my subjects and the spelling of verbs. She was taller than me, though not by much, and her hands and hair moved emphatically in her explanation. I went back to the board to make her changes, and the next day, I asked for corrections before I wrote anything.

Her name was Briseis. She was the first friend I ever had. 

 

Briseis suggested that we work on our French together after the first week of in-class corrections. And so the hours between classes and dinner found us in the library, heads bent together, her voice, gentle but bubbly, correcting me. It was still a struggle, especially with it being the afternoon. The books and stuffed chairs made the room cozy and I often wanted nothing more than to sleep when I was there. The French worksheets were hardly riveting enough to keep me awake, but Briseis’ jokes made up for it all.

(Even now, I can feel a laugh bubbling somewhere when I remember her false French accent, one that pronounced every word as American as possible;  _ Ge so-is fatigue. Ge so-is me-noiey. Pour-qoe ess-to rier? _ )

After that, I didn’t sit alone anywhere anymore. The classes were small enough that there was only one section of each class for each grade, but even if there wasn’t, Briseis’ friends took me in as one of their own. They were unlike me, and they and I both knew it, but still they were kind to me. It was not the type of thing I had come to expect, and even though I did not usually understand their conversations, for they didn’t pertain to me or my interests, these girls still offered social protection. I, without any better place to go, gratefully accepted. 

It did not last long, but still, I am thankful to them. Part of me will always regret leaving that clique for another, but I know that what was lost was far less than what was gained. And even in the end, I believe that any life without her is not one that is worth living.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Breseis is saying, albeit badly, "I am tired. I am bored. Why are you laughing?"
> 
> Also, for future reference, the rule is generally that characters meant to be female are still female, and characters meant to be male are usually female (except for, off the top of my head, Peleus, though I'm sure there are others and I'll put it in the notes ahead of time where it applies.)


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She looked at me, with those awful, cool, piercing eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, I don't know why it takes me three months to write 1k, but I guess that's the update schedule for this fic now

My classes did not get easier. But, life was not so bad as before. As the weeks turned from the warm September to cool October, I found myself content. French became a respite from the trials of the rest of the day, and even my other classes seemed less oppressive. 

Those first October mornings are something that I still miss. I have had better times since then, things more worthy of missing, and yet among the things I yearn for the most are those quiet mornings belonging to shadow, the fifty-degree air, and grass with bits of frost clinging to each blade. 

I remember that I welcomed the sun rising later; I found it easier to pretend I was at the end of the world in the dark. Yet still I was not alone. One morning I found that I had company.

I didn’t even recognize her as human at first, my half-asleep brain jumping to terror before reason. She scared me half to death, looking like a wraith come to take me away in the morning twilight. But no, she was only a girl, out on a run of her own. I didn’t know her, but when she saw me she turned and smiled, an edgy thing, cruel at the edges. I smiled back, wobbly, and we each carried on our own. 

I saw her again in English that day, too, and in the daylight her face looked sharp, cheekbones almost jutting out, strangely dangerous. I knew her from overheard conversations shouted across the classroom before the teacher arrived, but I didn’t know her name. She smiled at me again, tamer than before, and turned to the messy-haired girl sitting behind her. 

“Are you friends with Diomedes?” Briseis asked me. 

“No,” I said, hoping to keep my voice steady. 

“Oh,” she said, and then, “Did you like the reading last night?”

 

Diomedes, I knew, was the type of girl I should stay away from. Most of her conversations were talking about different girls, mocking them for being from the town, for being poor, for being less, or, when all else failed, she simply called them whores. If that was not enough for me to loathe, she was able to do well in math and English without trying. She was clever, could get away with just about anything because of it. To her peers, she was recklessly cruel, to her teachers, she was terribly charming.  

Did I know Diomedes? Not her, no, but I knew her type, I knew what made her up, I knew those characteristics and the way they treated me, I knew all I had to know. I knew what would be best - Staying away. I didn’t run for a few days, wanting to avoid her, but the first morning I was out there again, she was, too, and a moment later, she had caught up to me. 

“I scared you that first day, didn’t I?” She asked between huffs of air. She wasn’t sorry. She seemed proud, in a way.

“No,” I lied. 

“Oh. That’s good, then.” 

That was all she said to me that morning, and the lack of words made me so nervous I wanted to cut my run short only to get away from her. But then, what if she knew I didn’t like her and wanted to ruin my life for it? So I ran stiffly beside her until we reached the dormitory and she flashed me another one of those unnerving smiles. 

 

When I got back to my room Achilles was already up. Usually, she slept as late as possible, and seeing her up so early only made me more anxious. My hands started to shake. 

She looked at me, with those awful, cool, piercing eyes. “We should run together sometime,” she said.

Suddenly I was struck with another fear: Were Achilles and Diomedes warring with each other? Had Diomedes imposing herself on me turn my roommate further against me? I hadn’t meant to get in the middle of something, and I had no desire for it, either; I wanted to go unnoticed by all. 

“Sure,” I stuttered out, grabbed a pile of clothing I hoped was my uniform, and went to take a shower before Achilles could say anything else. 

If I could have, I would have stayed in bed all day, the first hours of being awake had been so awful. But I couldn’t, and instead, I made more mistakes than usual in my classes. I forgot how to conjugate verbs in French and only finished one problem in 45 minutes of math. When classes were over, I skipped meeting with Briseis and dinner, and took a nap instead.

When I woke, the sun had set, and my room was gloomy, except for Achilles’ desk lamp. She was bent over a book, hair falling into her face, working away at something I couldn’t see. I sat up.

“Hello,” she said, not so icy as usual. 

I nodded halfheartedly in reply. I felt dizzy from sleep, and didn’t think it was worth walking all the way to the practice rooms in the dark. Instead, I sat at the other desk in the room and did my work there. 

 

That night, while I lay awake in bed, unable to sleep for all I had gotten earlier in the day, I looked at the bed opposite mine. Achilles slept with her head back, lips slightly parted, hair haloing her face. Like Briar Rose, like Ophelia, like so many others I wasn’t well-read enough to make a comparison to. Her skin was light in the moonlight, like a statue’s, or like a body’s after death. Her neck arched like a deer’s, as though she might be caught in some Renaissance painting. 

This was the girl I had been set with. This was the girl I had to live up to, who I would be compared to for as long as I was here.   _ How?  _ There’d be no way, no competition. And, so, I rolled towards the wall and pushed it from my mind. Even then I could not sleep, but tossed and turned until grey dawn liberated me.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (On a more real note though, hi, the first half of this semester was very busy for me. I'm taking nine classes and I was in a play that was way more work than I expected, but I'm back now. I'm really sorry for the wait, and how short the chapters in this are, but, expect a few more updates on other fics and some one-shots relatively soon :) )

**Author's Note:**

> If y'all want to bother me with headcanons or prompts or wonderings about the next update, I have a tumblr right over here. 
> 
> And, of course, kudos and comments are always loved (and, if applicable, responded to!)


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